BNA reported this morning that, what with galloping expenditures on the war in Iraq, an unanticipated expense in trying to head of recession with a stimulus package, and the reduction in corporate tax revenues from the economic slowdown, "we could easily hit a $500 billion deficit this year," according to the director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). That would far exceed the nominal record of $412 billion, set in 2004 Peter Orszag, CBO chief, made his comments yesterday in a speech to the National Economists Club. We will see how this accords with the deficit projections to be issued by the White House on Monday, when it releases its budget for fiscal year 2009, which will include deficit projections for 2008. In the past, the White House has often issued inflated deficit projection figures so that it can try to claim later in the year to have "cut" the deficit, when the actual deficit figures for the year turn out much smaller than their projections.